RSE grants for four St Andrews research projects

Four research projects from the University of St Andrews have been selected for awards by the RSE Research Awards Programme.

The prestigious grant programme runs twice a year and aims to support Scotland’s research sector by nurturing promising talent, stimulating research in Scotland, and promoting international collaboration.

The St Andrews projects are among 46 from ten Scottish higher education institutions.

Dr Amy Blakeway, Senior Lecturer in the School of History, receives an RSE Personal Research Fellowship for a project entitled ‘War and Governance: destruction, reconstruction and reform in Scotland, 1542-1560’.

Dr Blakeway said: “The wars of the 1540s were the largest invasion of Scotland since the Wars of Independence – but so far no one has asked how they affected government within Scotland, how war might have encouraged the Scottish state to grow or how economic and social disruption may have fostered discontent with religious and political norms amongst its subjects.

“My RSE fellowship will allow me to use untapped urban archives throughout Scotland to answer these questions, and to develop resources for public use in exploring this crucial yet under-appreciated and under-researched period in Scottish history.”

Dr Filippo Costa Buranelli, Senior Lecturer in the School of International Relations, also receives an RSE Personal Research Fellowship for a project entitled ‘International society and central Asia – towards the construction of a regional order’.

Dr Costa Buranelli said: “The project, which will last 11 months and will involve fieldwork and archival work, seeks to shed light on the normative and political understanding of region- and order-making in Central Asia from 1991 to the present. More specifically, it is concerned with how intellectuals, diplomats and practitioners in the region have localised global norms to foster indigenous mechanisms of coexistence and cooperation.

“I look forward to embarking on this new exciting research project, and I am grateful to RSE for the award as well as to my referees, the University of St Andrews, my colleagues at School of International Relations, and my loved ones for the support in writing the grant proposal.”

Professor John Ferguson, Co-Director of the Centre for Social and Environmental Accounting Research (CSEAR) and Professor in the School of Management, receives an RSE Small Research Grant for a project entitled ‘The in-betweeners: examining the role and impact of ‘experts’ in business and human rights’.

Professor Ferguson said: “The UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs) explicitly encourage businesses to rely on ‘external expertise’ to assist in the implementation of corporate human rights responsibilities. The funding from RSE will support the first major exploration of the impact of business and human rights experts, from their role in the corporate implementation of the UNGPs to their influence on wider regulatory processes.”

Professor Frank Sullivan, with Professor Peter Donnelly and Dr. Margaret McCartney, from the School of Medicine, receives a RSE Research Workshops award for improving evidence-based early diagnosis.

Professor Sullivan said: “There is an inescapable tension between early diagnosis and overdiagnosis. Our workshop will bring together St Andrews Academics working as part of the Sir James Mackenzie Institute for Early Diagnosis, Oxford’s Centre for Evidence Based Medicine, patients, practitioners and policymakers from Scotland.

“We will discuss the nature and extent of the ethical, methodological and practical issues being experienced on this topic and make recommendations on how some of the issues may be handled.”